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COVID-19: The war in the wards

Aug 18, 2020
4 min read

by Denise Atanque

INSUFFERABLE. As the number of positive cases for COVID-19 increases nationwide, the burden on our frontliner shoulders is quickly becoming insufferable. ©www.rappler.com

5 months ago, many had assumed that the pandemic would be over by the month of July. Here we are now in the first week of August, 120,000 COVID-19 cases later, with thousands of personal protective equipment (PPEs) and N95s being reused due to shortage in jam-packed hospitals all over the country, and with exhausted frontliners nearing their breaking point— yet somehow, people in power still seem to think that we are doing just fine.

How could high infection rates and overworked frontliners be close to fine?

The Alliance of Health Workers (AHW) called upon authorities and President Rodrigo Duterte to acknowledge their concerns such as the lack of necessities for their duties and the need for another enhanced community quarantine to give the frontliners a chance to rest and quarantine themselves in the midst of this pandemic.

“The health workers’ conditions are neglected. There is no implementation of free mandatory testing to all health workers at least every two weeks, inadequate PPE, public hospitals are understaffed, and health workers still working 12 hours a day, low wages, and difficult transportation are among other problems,”

says AHW president Robert Mendoza in a statement, enumerating only the bird’s eye view of the struggles of a frontline.

The cry for help came from the people who were standing their ground as the first line of defense in this war against the COVID-19: the medical workforce. Among those who spoke up about the critical condition of the country’s medical workforce were public health specialists, nurses, doctors from both private and public hospitals, and many others. Because of their said concerns, they called on the government to implement another lockdown in Metro Manila, more specifically, a modified enhanced community quarantine (MECQ), to lessen the spread of the virus and to allow frontliners to take a break and rethink their tactics on tackling this pandemic.

As each day goes by without a concrete plan, the situation at hospitals across the country grows worse in comparison to what is shown by the media. Hospital wards are overflowing with COVID-19 patients left and right. The number of incoming patients is greater than the number of patients who are discharged by the hospital. More and more health workers are getting sick and infected.

The reality of what the people in the first line of defense go through became the springboard for this workforce to cry for help and hit the alarm; our frontliners aren’t just tired, they’re overworked and exhausted.

“What we are experiencing now is worse than what we have experienced in the beginning. If we don’t take a timeout now, my countrymen, what will happen to the health workers who will protect us?”

Dr. Lei-Camiling-Alfonso, a technical specialist of the Philippine Science of Public Health Physicians, said during the health workers’ forum on Saturday.

Data from the Octa research group of experts shows that many hospitals are in danger of becoming fully packed with COVID-19 patients in the next two weeks. This propelled the AHW to suggest another lockdown. The course of action that the authorities take in the next two weeks is crucial in determining the country’s fate with this war against COVID-19; this is one we cannot afford to lose.

“Our purpose really is to help, to get some breather, to really make sure that we are doing the right thing,” said Philippine Medical Association president Dr. Jose Santiago Jr. (Casas et al, 2020).

Last August 3, President Rodrigo Duterte heeded to the requests and pleas of the frontliners and announced that another 2-week long MECQ shall be implemented immediately the next day, which will last until August 18.

The only step that the government has decided to take on this matter, aside from implementing the MECQ, is the order of the Department of Health (DOH) to increase the bed capacity of hospitals by 30 percent, 50 percent, or even 70 percent if need be. The problem with this, as said by Dr. Ronnie Baticulon, a neurosurgeon from the Philippine General Hospital’s coronavirus response team, is that adding beds is not simply repositioning and adjusting beds, but also adjusting the delegated patients to respective nurses and health workers. Aside from this, DOH also announced that they will be hiring thousands of health workers during the timeout period of the MECQ (Sabillo, 2020). As of August 2, 6,510 health workers have already been hired by the government out of the 9,365 slots for emergency hiring across more than 300 health facilities.

As if the burden was not heavy enough, Senator Cynthia Villar dismissed the call for help of the frontliners, saying that there is no need to do so. Regarding her stance on the request of the health workers, Villar said over a radio station interview, “Hindi na siguro. Pagbutihin na lang nila trabaho nila.” (Marquez, 2020).

Frontliners have reached their breaking point. Philippine College of Physicians’ Dr Maricar Limpin said, “All they ask is that the government listen. Help us. We don’t want to break.”

The frontliners that we had back in March are not the same frontliners we have now; a significant number of them have chosen to withdraw from waging on this losing war, resigning from their duty for the fear of contracting the virus, from peer pressure, and from other factors that all boil down to the virus.

These health workers took the first line of defense against this war with COVID-19 because they have no choice. If they had the luxury of choosing, they would not have even thought twice about it— but they cannot.

With all the energy that our health workers have drawn and poured out for government who cares quite little about their pay and well-being, this is where the line has to be drawn. Enough is enough.

5 months ago, we assumed that we would be back to normal by the month of July. Here we are in the first week of August, still caught in the middle of the crossfire when other countries have found their way out of it.

With this kind of government and management, is there still hope for the Filipinos?